The cry of the olive tree
And then the cry: Why have you abandoned me? Why have you deceived me?
Destined for men, for government and science, for landowners and land workers, of centuries-old olive trees and beyond, who have struggled with poor, arid, and barren lands, on the borders of West and East, to produce fruit exported throughout Europe.
We are in Salento, in Puglia, in southern Italy, a small peninsula surrounded by the Ionian Sea, which then becomes, beyond the Strait of Otranto, the Adriatic Sea.
We are a few kilometers from Albania, Greece, and Montenegro.
We are in a borderland between West and East, a land that has always been crossed by travelers heading for the Promised or Holy Land, or the Indies.
A dry, calcareous, and dry land dominated by the “Mediterranean maquis” and the olive tree, a tenacious, age-old, and faithful plant. The maquis was first replaced by fig plantations, then by vines of mainly red grapes.
In 2013, a catastrophic epidemic occurred caused by Xilema fastidiosa, a phytopathogenic bacterium that infects the xylem system of plants, blocking the flow of water and nutrients and causing rapid olive detachment syndrome.
Genomic analysis suggests that the pathogen arrived in southern Italy in 2008 from a Central American coffee tree.
This series, dedicated to the dying olive tree, joins the “Salty Hands and Seafarers” series to form part of the graphic photography collection “You Don’t Know Salento.”
May 31, 2025
